


Same Thing All Over Again

by nagi_schwarz



Series: Play Along [15]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: F/M, M/M, band au, musician au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-01
Updated: 2016-07-01
Packaged: 2018-07-19 10:47:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7358134
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nagi_schwarz/pseuds/nagi_schwarz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the comment_fic prompt: "Stargate Atlantis, John Sheppard +/ Rodney McKay, 'Something Is Not Right With Me'."</p><p>John comes to clean to Rodney...but not about that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Same Thing All Over Again

“Something is not right with you,” Rodney said, stomping onto the bus after the team pit stop.  
  
John, engrossed in his sudoku puzzle book, nodded absently. “Something is not right with me.”  
  
Teyla lifted her head, ready to mediate any kind of argument. Rodney and John had been getting along much better ever since Rodney learned the truth about John’s mother, but old habits died hard, and their first tendency was toward sarcasm and insults, even if both were more genuinely affectionate these days.  
  
Rodney threw down a magazine. “Look! It says here that you’re dating Jennifer.”  
  
John’s head whipped up, and he snatched up the magazine. “What? Where?”  
  
Rodney reached out and flipped to the appropriate page for him. “See?”  
  
Teyla, Ronon, Jennifer, and Evan crowded around. The photos did look - incriminating. John and Jennifer sitting opposite each other in a restaurant, laughing, heads bent close. John and Jennifer walking together. John and Jennifer sitting next to each other, looking at the same notebook. Jennifer hugging John. John with an arm around her shoulders.  
  
“Why does everyone think you get all the girls? I’m obviously better-looking,” Rodney said.  
  
“It also appears that the reporters are simply not including photos of the times you and Jennifer are together,” Teyla said.  
  
Ronon frowned. “I don’t recognize most of these places. When did you guys go get tacos without us?”  
  
“We usually go out and get food when you guys are in the Snakeskinners pit,” Jennifer explained. It was true, John and Jennifer declined to join them in the pit most nights. John never joined them, and as a kindness Jennifer usually spent time with him until the after-party. Teyla suspected that John was much more worried about the difficulties in his family life than he let on - after all, he generally refused to tell anyone how he was feeling, and then his guitar solos dripped with emotion - and that it was making him ill. He did seem much more pale and tired these days, and a little thinner too. But maybe that was his new, short hair. Made his cheekbones more pronounced.  
  
“What about this photo?” Evan asked. It was the one where John and Jennifer were looking at a notebook together.  
  
“Jennifer had some suggestions about that song I wrote,” John said. “She was singing it for me so I could get a sense of what it sounded like better.”  
  
“Everyone knows we’re dating,” Jennifer said. “Everyone who matters. Our families.”  
  
“I get that you’re the star of the band and teenagers are interested in your love life,” Rodney said, “but I’m more than good-looking enough for you.”  
  
“You are,” John agreed.  
  
Ronon nudged him, and he winced.  
  
Teyla had initially been pleased at how well John and Jennifer got along, but now she was concerned. If Jennifer ever found out about John’s feelings for Rodney.  
  
Rodney snorted and threw down another magazine. “Tell that to the reporters.”  
  
Evan flipped open the magazine to a feature story about the band. Teyla was touted as the band leader, as Elizabeth had instructed, and Jennifer did not seem to mind being described as her ‘lovely lieutenant’. Ronon preened when he saw how much the reporter had made of his impressive biceps.  
  
Rodney cleared his throat and read. “‘Rounding out the band is guitarist John Sheppard, with his delicate elfin good-looks and magic hands. Rodney McKay, the band’s songwriter, sound engineer, and producer, is conventionally handsome, with dark blond hair and a square jaw, but it’s John who the female fans rally around, donning Johnny Cash shirts and silvery shades.’”  
  
“There _is_ something wrong with you,” Ronon said. He poked John in the ear. “Elf.”  
  
John rolled his eyes, swatted Ronon’s hand aside. “Rodney, you’re incredibly good-looking. Ignore the reporters. Obviously they’re stupid.”  
  
Rodney narrowed his eyes. “You’re trying to flatter me. What are you hiding? Are you trying to steal Jennifer from me?”  
  
“Rodney!” Jennifer cried.  
  
“You do not think well of either Jennifer or John if you suggest such a thing,” Teyla began, but Rodney plowed ahead.  
  
“You don’t even _try_ to do it, do you? You’re just oblivious to your own - own Sheppard-y charm. First Jeannie, then Nancy, now Jennifer? Who’s next, Teyla?”

Jennifer looked terribly embarrassed, as she often did when Rodney became upset over strange things.  
  
“No!” John snapped. “Dammit, Rodney, I’m gay!”  
  
Evan, who’d been trying to scoop up the offending magazines to throw them away, paused. “I’m sorry, what?”  
  
“Gay,” John said, and his face was flushed bright pink, chest heaving like he’d just done the hundred yard dash.  
  
Teyla exchanged looks with Ronon. Was he going to do it? Was he finally going to admit -?  
  
“Jennifer realized, and she’s been really supportive about it,” John said.  
  
Evan eased his cell phone out of his pocket and began sending rapid-fire text messages.  
  
“Of course Jennifer’s supportive, she’s a wonderful human being,” Rodney said, “but that doesn’t begin to explain why - hang on.” He peered at Ronon and Teyla. “You don’t look surprised.”  
  
Teyla didn’t even try to feign an expression of surprise.  
  
Rodney threw up his hands. “This is like your mother, isn’t it? Why am I always the last to know?”  
  
“I didn’t tell them,” John protested. “They figured it out. And it wasn’t in a newspaper either.”  
  
“Why do you keep so many secrets?” Rodney dragged a hand through his hair.  
  
Teyla wondered the same thing, wondered why John was so untrusting of those around him, even people he claimed to call friends.  
  
“I wanted to join the Air Force, remember?” John sighed.  
  
Realization lit in Rodney’s eyes. “I remember. You wore that stupid little uniform.”  
  
“And one thing they have in the armed forces is?”  
  
“Don’t ask, don’t tell. Okay, fine, so you weren’t telling. But you’re not joining the Air Force anymore, so what’s the big deal?”  
  
“I still applied to join, had to fill out paperwork, take an oath,” John said. “I don’t want this to get back to them.”  
  
“Fine,” Rodney said. “But once Jennifer knew, why didn’t you just tell me?”  
  
John hesitated a moment too long.  
  
Rodney’s eyes went wide. “You think I’m homophobic?”  
  
Teyla and Ronon exchanged glances again. They knew John thought no such thing about Rodney, that John was afraid if Rodney knew, Rodney would realize how John really felt about him.  
  
“You think I’m homophobic! I’m going to prove I’m not.” Rodney swiped the magazines off the table and stomped to the back of the bus where the biggest bunk was for him and Jennifer to share.  
  
John called after him, “I don’t! I don’t think you’re like that.”  
  
But it was too late. Once Rodney had his mind set on something, it was very difficult to dissuade him.   
  
Teyla supposed none of them should have been surprised, the next day, after the free hour Evan gave them to play tourist in the venue town, that Rodney showed up to soundcheck wearing a shirt decorated with inverted rainbow triangles.  
  
Teyla was surprised when, two days later, a teen magazine had a feature article about how Rodney was gay and John was helping Jennifer soothe her broken heart. Rodney’s indignant cries could be heard from outside the bus. It took Evan and Elizabeth together to calm him down, and at the next interview, Rodney explained that one of his friends had come out to him and said friend was in a difficult position and he was wearing Pride regalia as a show of support, and when a whole host of fans had rainbow banners and flags at the next concert, Teyla decided that a crisis had been averted.  
  
Except John was looking even more pale with love than before.


End file.
